Consequentialists oppose while absolutists and deontologists rely upon double-effect reasoning (DER) to address hard cases in which good inextricably binds with evil (such as destroying a legitimate ...
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Consequentialists oppose while absolutists and deontologists rely upon double-effect reasoning (DER) to address hard cases in which good inextricably binds with evil (such as destroying a legitimate military target while concomitantly and foreseeably killing innocents). This book addresses the history, application, and philosophical controversy concerning DER. It traces both the origin of DER in the thought of Aquinas and its development by subsequent ethicists. Considering consequentialist criticisms, proportionalism, and recent revisions of double effect, the book argues at length for the reasonableness of DER, particularly the intended/foreseen distinction. Intent is distinguished from foresight, and this distinction is applied to the classic cases of terror and tactical bombing. Most importantly, the book establishes the ethical relevance of this distinction, grounding its import both in broadly Aristotelian-Thomistic features of action as voluntary, and in a Kantian focus on the victim as an end in himself. The book also considers typically neglected albeit intriguing issues such as DER’s application to allowings and how constitutional legal systems that incorporate exceptionless norms employ a legal analogue to DER.Less

Double-Effect Reasoning : Doing Good and Avoiding Evil

T. A. Cavanaugh

Published in print: 2006-08-01

Consequentialists oppose while absolutists and deontologists rely upon double-effect reasoning (DER) to address hard cases in which good inextricably binds with evil (such as destroying a legitimate military target while concomitantly and foreseeably killing innocents). This book addresses the history, application, and philosophical controversy concerning DER. It traces both the origin of DER in the thought of Aquinas and its development by subsequent ethicists. Considering consequentialist criticisms, proportionalism, and recent revisions of double effect, the book argues at length for the reasonableness of DER, particularly the intended/foreseen distinction. Intent is distinguished from foresight, and this distinction is applied to the classic cases of terror and tactical bombing. Most importantly, the book establishes the ethical relevance of this distinction, grounding its import both in broadly Aristotelian-Thomistic features of action as voluntary, and in a Kantian focus on the victim as an end in himself. The book also considers typically neglected albeit intriguing issues such as DER’s application to allowings and how constitutional legal systems that incorporate exceptionless norms employ a legal analogue to DER.

Philosophers have long inquired into the nature and even the possibility of human knowledge. This book identifies two mistaken assumptions that have fundamentally shaped that tradition of ...
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Philosophers have long inquired into the nature and even the possibility of human knowledge. This book identifies two mistaken assumptions that have fundamentally shaped that tradition of philosophical thought. Correcting those assumptions results in a unique theory of knowledge — one that conceives of it in a rigorous yet non-absolutist way. This theory offers new solutions to many venerable philosophical puzzles.Less

Good Knowledge, Bad Knowledge : On Two Dogmas of Epistemology

Stephen Hetherington

Published in print: 2001-10-18

Philosophers have long inquired into the nature and even the possibility of human knowledge. This book identifies two mistaken assumptions that have fundamentally shaped that tradition of philosophical thought. Correcting those assumptions results in a unique theory of knowledge — one that conceives of it in a rigorous yet non-absolutist way. This theory offers new solutions to many venerable philosophical puzzles.

This is a study of the ideology of monarchy in late medieval Europe. In the 15th and early 16th centuries, European monarchies faced a series of crises and conflicts, which gave rise to intense ...
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This is a study of the ideology of monarchy in late medieval Europe. In the 15th and early 16th centuries, European monarchies faced a series of crises and conflicts, which gave rise to intense debate as to the nature and authority of monarchy in its various forms. From such debates and polemics emerged many of the ideas that were to sustain the later confrontation between ‘absolutism’ and ‘constitutionalism’. This book examines the ideas generated by various crises of monarchy in France, England, the Spanish kingdoms, and what still claimed to be the ‘universal’ monarchies of Empire and Papacy.Less

J. H. Burns

Published in print: 1992-07-02

This is a study of the ideology of monarchy in late medieval Europe. In the 15th and early 16th centuries, European monarchies faced a series of crises and conflicts, which gave rise to intense debate as to the nature and authority of monarchy in its various forms. From such debates and polemics emerged many of the ideas that were to sustain the later confrontation between ‘absolutism’ and ‘constitutionalism’. This book examines the ideas generated by various crises of monarchy in France, England, the Spanish kingdoms, and what still claimed to be the ‘universal’ monarchies of Empire and Papacy.

The English civil wars of the mid-seventeenth century produced two political thinkers of genius: Thomas Hobbes and James Harrington. They are known today as spokesmen of opposite positions, Hobbes of ...
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The English civil wars of the mid-seventeenth century produced two political thinkers of genius: Thomas Hobbes and James Harrington. They are known today as spokesmen of opposite positions, Hobbes of absolutism, Harrington of republicanism. Yet behind their disagreements, this book argues, there lay a common perspective. For both writers, the primary aim was the restoration of peace and order to a divided land. Both men saw the conventional thinking of the time as unequal to that task. Their greatest works — Hobbes's Leviathan of 1651, Harrington's Oceana of 1656 — proposed the reconstruction of the English polity on novel bases. It was not over the principle of sovereignty that the two men differed. The author of this book shows Harrington to have been, no less than Hobbes, a theorist of absolute sovereignty. But where Hobbes repudiated the mixed governments of classical antiquity, Harrington's study of them convinced him that mixed government, far from being the enemy of absolute sovereignty, was its essential foundation.Less

Sovereignty and the Sword : Harrington, Hobbes, and Mixed Government in the English Civil Wars

Arihiro Fukuda

Published in print: 1997-10-16

The English civil wars of the mid-seventeenth century produced two political thinkers of genius: Thomas Hobbes and James Harrington. They are known today as spokesmen of opposite positions, Hobbes of absolutism, Harrington of republicanism. Yet behind their disagreements, this book argues, there lay a common perspective. For both writers, the primary aim was the restoration of peace and order to a divided land. Both men saw the conventional thinking of the time as unequal to that task. Their greatest works — Hobbes's Leviathan of 1651, Harrington's Oceana of 1656 — proposed the reconstruction of the English polity on novel bases. It was not over the principle of sovereignty that the two men differed. The author of this book shows Harrington to have been, no less than Hobbes, a theorist of absolute sovereignty. But where Hobbes repudiated the mixed governments of classical antiquity, Harrington's study of them convinced him that mixed government, far from being the enemy of absolute sovereignty, was its essential foundation.

The ideology of sacred monarchy prevailed in all three cultures, absolutism in Byzantium and Islam. Monarchs had a duty to rule justly, which in Islam meant according to the Shari'a. European views ...
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The ideology of sacred monarchy prevailed in all three cultures, absolutism in Byzantium and Islam. Monarchs had a duty to rule justly, which in Islam meant according to the Shari'a. European views of justice derived partly from Roman law and Stoicism. In all three, justice included ruling according to the laws. Constitutionalism developed partly out of the separation of roles between rulers and clergy or 'ulama. The Sunni caliph and Byzantine emperor were, in theory, appointed by election. Both caliph and king were tied to their subjects by oath, but only in Europe were legal restraints made specific and formal. Islamic jurists preferred, on prudential grounds, non-resistance. In Europe, the king's power was balanced by parliaments claiming to represent the whole kingdom. There was no corporate representation in Byzantium or Islam. In Europe, city republics were ruled by elected officials.Less

Regimes: Europe, Islam, and Byzantium

Antony Black

Published in print: 2008-01-17

The ideology of sacred monarchy prevailed in all three cultures, absolutism in Byzantium and Islam. Monarchs had a duty to rule justly, which in Islam meant according to the Shari'a. European views of justice derived partly from Roman law and Stoicism. In all three, justice included ruling according to the laws. Constitutionalism developed partly out of the separation of roles between rulers and clergy or 'ulama. The Sunni caliph and Byzantine emperor were, in theory, appointed by election. Both caliph and king were tied to their subjects by oath, but only in Europe were legal restraints made specific and formal. Islamic jurists preferred, on prudential grounds, non-resistance. In Europe, the king's power was balanced by parliaments claiming to represent the whole kingdom. There was no corporate representation in Byzantium or Islam. In Europe, city republics were ruled by elected officials.

This chapter introduces Part II, examining the ticking bomb question as one of public, practical, morality in the real world, namely whether it is morally justifiable for democratic states facing ...
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This chapter introduces Part II, examining the ticking bomb question as one of public, practical, morality in the real world, namely whether it is morally justifiable for democratic states facing terrorism to torture in order to save many innocent lives. It outlines the parameters for discussing the question. Part II is to first address the question of whether transferring the ‘torture in a ticking bomb situation’ (TBS) moral dilemma from the private to the public sphere in itself entails a different moral solution. Secondly, the question is to be addressed of whether — accepting arguendo that torture in this situation is morally justified — states can torture in TBSs while limiting both torture and its direct and indirect harm to a morally acceptable level, or else must slide down an inevitable, and intolerable ‘slippery slope’. ‘Slippery surface’ dangers unique to the public sphere are also discussed.Less

Part II—Introduction

Yuval Ginbar

Published in print: 2008-03-27

This chapter introduces Part II, examining the ticking bomb question as one of public, practical, morality in the real world, namely whether it is morally justifiable for democratic states facing terrorism to torture in order to save many innocent lives. It outlines the parameters for discussing the question. Part II is to first address the question of whether transferring the ‘torture in a ticking bomb situation’ (TBS) moral dilemma from the private to the public sphere in itself entails a different moral solution. Secondly, the question is to be addressed of whether — accepting arguendo that torture in this situation is morally justified — states can torture in TBSs while limiting both torture and its direct and indirect harm to a morally acceptable level, or else must slide down an inevitable, and intolerable ‘slippery slope’. ‘Slippery surface’ dangers unique to the public sphere are also discussed.

An examination is made of a genealogy of pluralist approaches to multiplicity and difference in the twentieth century, starting with William James (1976 [1912], 1977 [1909]), who began his study of ...
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An examination is made of a genealogy of pluralist approaches to multiplicity and difference in the twentieth century, starting with William James (1976 [1912], 1977 [1909]), who began his study of pluralism with a ‘radical empiricism’ that is opposed to a more singular, monist position. James argued that our experiences of empirical events diverge, and one explanation could never encompass all of those experiences; other political pluralists (Arthur Bentley, Ernest Barker, Harold Laski, Mary Parker Follett) took James’s critique of absolutism and applied it to the state. Post-Second World War pluralists used the concept of heterogeneity in a much more constricted sense to defend and promote self-interested interest groups. However, more recently, there has been a return to multiplicities, and Donna Haraway’s (1988) description of ‘situated knowledges’ and ‘embodied objectivity’, in which she argues for ‘epistemologies of location’ where claims of knowledge can only be considered partial, resurrects James. The argument here is that a return to such original notions of pluralism helps validate the diversity of experiences and knowledges that grow out of the variety of ways we are all situated in any number of experiences, including environmental degradation.Less

Pluralism and Difference: A Genealogy of Multiplicity

David Schlosberg

Published in print: 2002-08-22

An examination is made of a genealogy of pluralist approaches to multiplicity and difference in the twentieth century, starting with William James (1976 [1912], 1977 [1909]), who began his study of pluralism with a ‘radical empiricism’ that is opposed to a more singular, monist position. James argued that our experiences of empirical events diverge, and one explanation could never encompass all of those experiences; other political pluralists (Arthur Bentley, Ernest Barker, Harold Laski, Mary Parker Follett) took James’s critique of absolutism and applied it to the state. Post-Second World War pluralists used the concept of heterogeneity in a much more constricted sense to defend and promote self-interested interest groups. However, more recently, there has been a return to multiplicities, and Donna Haraway’s (1988) description of ‘situated knowledges’ and ‘embodied objectivity’, in which she argues for ‘epistemologies of location’ where claims of knowledge can only be considered partial, resurrects James. The argument here is that a return to such original notions of pluralism helps validate the diversity of experiences and knowledges that grow out of the variety of ways we are all situated in any number of experiences, including environmental degradation.

Political Science, Comparative Politics, International Relations and Politics

This chapter defends the moral importance of an intervener's fidelity to the principles to jus in bello (principles of just conduct in war). It begins by outlining the particular principles of ...
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This chapter defends the moral importance of an intervener's fidelity to the principles to jus in bello (principles of just conduct in war). It begins by outlining the particular principles of ‘external jus in bello’ that an intervener should follow (focusing largely on discrimination and proportionality). It draws on Jeff McMahan's work and the nature of humanitarian intervention to claim that these principles should be highly restrictive. The chapter then asserts two principles of ‘internal jus in bello’. The second section considers more broadly the moral underpinnings of the principles of jus in bello. It claims that consequentialist justifications of these principles cannot fully grasp their moral significance and particularly the difference between doing and allowing. The final section considers the ‘Absolutist Challenge’—that the principles of jus in bello defended are too important and consequently render humanitarian intervention impermissible. After rejecting the doctrine of double effect as a solution to this challenge, the chapter invokes the scalar account of legitimacy to respond to this objection.Less

An Intervener's Conduct: Humanitarian Intervention and Jus in Bello

James Pattison

Published in print: 2010-02-25

This chapter defends the moral importance of an intervener's fidelity to the principles to jus in bello (principles of just conduct in war). It begins by outlining the particular principles of ‘external jus in bello’ that an intervener should follow (focusing largely on discrimination and proportionality). It draws on Jeff McMahan's work and the nature of humanitarian intervention to claim that these principles should be highly restrictive. The chapter then asserts two principles of ‘internal jus in bello’. The second section considers more broadly the moral underpinnings of the principles of jus in bello. It claims that consequentialist justifications of these principles cannot fully grasp their moral significance and particularly the difference between doing and allowing. The final section considers the ‘Absolutist Challenge’—that the principles of jus in bello defended are too important and consequently render humanitarian intervention impermissible. After rejecting the doctrine of double effect as a solution to this challenge, the chapter invokes the scalar account of legitimacy to respond to this objection.

In Sumer government, religion, and culture were based on city-states, ruled by kings who were personally chose by the city god. Unlike Egypt, supreme authority circulated from city to city. Royal ...
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In Sumer government, religion, and culture were based on city-states, ruled by kings who were personally chose by the city god. Unlike Egypt, supreme authority circulated from city to city. Royal absolutism developed when the Akkadians introduced tribal dynastic authority, and, further north, in Assyria. There was a generalized notion of kingship, or the state, which had to perform certain functions: maintenance of the god's estate, of justice and prosperity. Kings were to redress grievances of the poor against the powerful. Some kings issued law codes. There were assemblies of citizens, corresponding perhaps to the gods' assembly. Whether there was primitive democracy has been disputed, but citizens appear to have had some judicial and commercial powers.Less

Mesopotamia, Assyria, Babylon

Antony Black

Published in print: 2009-05-01

In Sumer government, religion, and culture were based on city-states, ruled by kings who were personally chose by the city god. Unlike Egypt, supreme authority circulated from city to city. Royal absolutism developed when the Akkadians introduced tribal dynastic authority, and, further north, in Assyria. There was a generalized notion of kingship, or the state, which had to perform certain functions: maintenance of the god's estate, of justice and prosperity. Kings were to redress grievances of the poor against the powerful. Some kings issued law codes. There were assemblies of citizens, corresponding perhaps to the gods' assembly. Whether there was primitive democracy has been disputed, but citizens appear to have had some judicial and commercial powers.

This chapter outlines the developments against which one can understand the emergence of Soviet city-building—painting a picture of successive formations of government from Petrine absolutism to ...
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This chapter outlines the developments against which one can understand the emergence of Soviet city-building—painting a picture of successive formations of government from Petrine absolutism to Soviet total planning. In the Soviet period, the city emerges precisely as that space in which large-scale readjustments of the population's distribution and way of life can be governmentally managed. The chapter then traces the articulation and subsequent redeployment of two critical instruments of government—budgets and infrastructures. Initially developed in the state-building and modernizing projects of the Russian absolutist state, these instruments were turned—first in the late tsarist period, then in the Soviet period—to various subsequent tasks of development and social welfare, and embedded in the mechanisms of Soviet planning. Their present significance lies, in part, in the fact that they were identified as critical targets of neoliberal reform after Soviet breakup, and will thus be crucial for assessing the postsocialist fate of Soviet social modernity.Less

The Birth of Soviet Biopolitics

Stephen J. Collier

Published in print: 2011-08-28

This chapter outlines the developments against which one can understand the emergence of Soviet city-building—painting a picture of successive formations of government from Petrine absolutism to Soviet total planning. In the Soviet period, the city emerges precisely as that space in which large-scale readjustments of the population's distribution and way of life can be governmentally managed. The chapter then traces the articulation and subsequent redeployment of two critical instruments of government—budgets and infrastructures. Initially developed in the state-building and modernizing projects of the Russian absolutist state, these instruments were turned—first in the late tsarist period, then in the Soviet period—to various subsequent tasks of development and social welfare, and embedded in the mechanisms of Soviet planning. Their present significance lies, in part, in the fact that they were identified as critical targets of neoliberal reform after Soviet breakup, and will thus be crucial for assessing the postsocialist fate of Soviet social modernity.

On the eve of the French Revolution, there were few more truly ‘absolutist’ states than the lands of the House of Savoy. Yet there were also few as predicated on rule by educated meritocracy or ...
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On the eve of the French Revolution, there were few more truly ‘absolutist’ states than the lands of the House of Savoy. Yet there were also few as predicated on rule by educated meritocracy or pragmatic, if authoritarian reform. The Savoyard domains remain among the least known or understood of the second rank powers of the eighteenth century, but their internal history offers a remarkable insight into the workings of an absolutist regime, faced with the growing social and economic crisis in the last decades of pre-revolutionary Europe. This chapter first explores the reactions of the Savoyard monarchy to the internal crisis it faced on the eve of the French invasion. It then analyses its disintegration under the onslaught of the first Italian campaign.Less

The End of a Golden Age or the Implosion of a False Absolutism? The Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia from Absolutism to Revolution, 1685–1814

Michael Broers

Published in print: 2013-03-28

On the eve of the French Revolution, there were few more truly ‘absolutist’ states than the lands of the House of Savoy. Yet there were also few as predicated on rule by educated meritocracy or pragmatic, if authoritarian reform. The Savoyard domains remain among the least known or understood of the second rank powers of the eighteenth century, but their internal history offers a remarkable insight into the workings of an absolutist regime, faced with the growing social and economic crisis in the last decades of pre-revolutionary Europe. This chapter first explores the reactions of the Savoyard monarchy to the internal crisis it faced on the eve of the French invasion. It then analyses its disintegration under the onslaught of the first Italian campaign.

This chapter assesses the charge of humanism against absolutism. For the typical absolutist, they have the capacity to provide an account of the world that is both true and clean. This claim, in the ...
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This chapter assesses the charge of humanism against absolutism. For the typical absolutist, they have the capacity to provide an account of the world that is both true and clean. This claim, in the humanist's view, is lacking in humility because it is one that someone could only have reason to accept if he or she were possessed of enhanced cognitive powers they in fact lack. Implicitly and illegitimately, therefore, absolutism pretends to an exalted cognitive capacity. The first section chronicles the points of both the ascending and descending absolutism. The second section explains the problems in the ‘super-spectator's position’. The third and fourth sections investigate the role of science and scientific realism. The last section explains the side of atypical absolutist. The chapter concludes that typical absolutism stands convicted of hubris, of positing cognitive capabilities that there is good reason to suppose human beings could never possess.Less

The Hubris of Absolutism

David E. Cooper

Published in print: 2007-12-27

This chapter assesses the charge of humanism against absolutism. For the typical absolutist, they have the capacity to provide an account of the world that is both true and clean. This claim, in the humanist's view, is lacking in humility because it is one that someone could only have reason to accept if he or she were possessed of enhanced cognitive powers they in fact lack. Implicitly and illegitimately, therefore, absolutism pretends to an exalted cognitive capacity. The first section chronicles the points of both the ascending and descending absolutism. The second section explains the problems in the ‘super-spectator's position’. The third and fourth sections investigate the role of science and scientific realism. The last section explains the side of atypical absolutist. The chapter concludes that typical absolutism stands convicted of hubris, of positing cognitive capabilities that there is good reason to suppose human beings could never possess.

This chapter explains what liberalism is. It is easy to list famous liberals, but it is harder to say what they have in common. John Locke, Adam Smith, Montesquieu, Thomas Jefferson, John Stuart ...
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This chapter explains what liberalism is. It is easy to list famous liberals, but it is harder to say what they have in common. John Locke, Adam Smith, Montesquieu, Thomas Jefferson, John Stuart Mill, Lord Acton, T. H. Green, John Dewey, and contemporaries such as Isaiah Berlin and John Rawls are certainly liberals. However, they do not agree on issues such as the boundaries of toleration, the legitimacy of the welfare state, and the virtues of democracy. They do not even agree on the nature of the liberty they think liberals ought to seek. The chapter considers classical versus modern liberalism, the divide within liberal theory between liberalism and libertarianism, and liberal opposition to absolutism, religious authority, and capitalism. It also discusses liberalism as a theory for the individual, society, and the state.Less

Liberalism

Alan Ryan

Published in print: 2012-08-05

This chapter explains what liberalism is. It is easy to list famous liberals, but it is harder to say what they have in common. John Locke, Adam Smith, Montesquieu, Thomas Jefferson, John Stuart Mill, Lord Acton, T. H. Green, John Dewey, and contemporaries such as Isaiah Berlin and John Rawls are certainly liberals. However, they do not agree on issues such as the boundaries of toleration, the legitimacy of the welfare state, and the virtues of democracy. They do not even agree on the nature of the liberty they think liberals ought to seek. The chapter considers classical versus modern liberalism, the divide within liberal theory between liberalism and libertarianism, and liberal opposition to absolutism, religious authority, and capitalism. It also discusses liberalism as a theory for the individual, society, and the state.

This book examines the contours and distinctive features of Jewish experience in the lands of Bohemia and Moravia (the present-day Czech Republic), from the late eighteenth to the late twentieth ...
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This book examines the contours and distinctive features of Jewish experience in the lands of Bohemia and Moravia (the present-day Czech Republic), from the late eighteenth to the late twentieth century. In the Czech lands, the book states, Jews have felt the need constantly to define and articulate the nature of group identity, cultural loyalty, memory, and social cohesiveness, and the period of “modernizing” absolutism, which began in 1780, brought changes of enormous significance. From that time forward, new relationships with Gentile society and with the culture of the state blurred the traditional outlines of community and individual identity. The book navigates skillfully among histories and myths as well as demography, biography, culture, and politics, illuminating the maze of allegiances and alliances that have molded the Jewish experience during these 200 years.Less

Languages of Community : The Jewish Experience in the Czech Lands

Hillel Kieval

Published in print: 2000-12-26

This book examines the contours and distinctive features of Jewish experience in the lands of Bohemia and Moravia (the present-day Czech Republic), from the late eighteenth to the late twentieth century. In the Czech lands, the book states, Jews have felt the need constantly to define and articulate the nature of group identity, cultural loyalty, memory, and social cohesiveness, and the period of “modernizing” absolutism, which began in 1780, brought changes of enormous significance. From that time forward, new relationships with Gentile society and with the culture of the state blurred the traditional outlines of community and individual identity. The book navigates skillfully among histories and myths as well as demography, biography, culture, and politics, illuminating the maze of allegiances and alliances that have molded the Jewish experience during these 200 years.

This chapter focuses on the dominant political economy models that try to explain the relation between markets and states in Europe's early modern economies. Placed into the context of Spanish ...
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This chapter focuses on the dominant political economy models that try to explain the relation between markets and states in Europe's early modern economies. Placed into the context of Spanish history, some of the main assumptions of the model turn out to be highly problematic and in urgent need of revision. A lopsided focus on the state as predator has distracted economists and economic historians from trying to understand better how states became jurisdictionally and economically integrated units in the first place. The void has been filled by a number of poorly historicized references to concepts borrowed from historians and historical sociologists such as “absolutism” and “patrimonialism.” These concepts were supposed to delineate the development of European states from fragmented sovereignty to unified nation-states.Less

Markets and States

Regina Grafe

Published in print: 2012-01-08

This chapter focuses on the dominant political economy models that try to explain the relation between markets and states in Europe's early modern economies. Placed into the context of Spanish history, some of the main assumptions of the model turn out to be highly problematic and in urgent need of revision. A lopsided focus on the state as predator has distracted economists and economic historians from trying to understand better how states became jurisdictionally and economically integrated units in the first place. The void has been filled by a number of poorly historicized references to concepts borrowed from historians and historical sociologists such as “absolutism” and “patrimonialism.” These concepts were supposed to delineate the development of European states from fragmented sovereignty to unified nation-states.

This chapter discusses how domestic market integration in Spain was much slower than it's integration with the international economy over the long run, and its progress was regionally extremely ...
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This chapter discusses how domestic market integration in Spain was much slower than it's integration with the international economy over the long run, and its progress was regionally extremely diverse. Poor transport technology and bad roads did not help matters and provide some of the background for understanding Spanish markets. Still, transport itself exhibited a trend toward slow but steady improvement over the century and a half under consideration here. Moreover, there is little evidence that Spain's political economy suffered from the sort of expropriatory failings of supposedly centralizing, all-powerful “absolutist” states that earlier literature had diagnosed. As historians of the Spanish Empire have long pointed out, in the Spanish monarchy, even in its European core, absolutism was merely a political aspiration.Less

Distant Tyranny : The Historic Territories

Regina Grafe

Published in print: 2012-01-08

This chapter discusses how domestic market integration in Spain was much slower than it's integration with the international economy over the long run, and its progress was regionally extremely diverse. Poor transport technology and bad roads did not help matters and provide some of the background for understanding Spanish markets. Still, transport itself exhibited a trend toward slow but steady improvement over the century and a half under consideration here. Moreover, there is little evidence that Spain's political economy suffered from the sort of expropriatory failings of supposedly centralizing, all-powerful “absolutist” states that earlier literature had diagnosed. As historians of the Spanish Empire have long pointed out, in the Spanish monarchy, even in its European core, absolutism was merely a political aspiration.

This chapter examines public credit and political representation in three European territorial states: France, Castile, and Holland. It tackles the following question: If having a representative ...
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This chapter examines public credit and political representation in three European territorial states: France, Castile, and Holland. It tackles the following question: If having a representative assembly with strong control over finance had major advantages, then why could territorial states not emulate the institutions present in their city-state neighbors? The chapter first considers the early history of the rentes sur l'Hôtel de Ville and how it set the stage for the French monarchy's frequent difficulty in later obtaining access to credit. It then discusses absolutism in Castile and Castilian public credit in the seventeenth century, along with representative assemblies in the Dutch Republic. The experience of France, Castile, and the Dutch Republic shows that most territorial states faced obstacles in establishing an intensive form of political representation, and thus in gaining access to credit.Less

Three Territorial State Experiences

David Stasavage

Published in print: 2011-07-25

This chapter examines public credit and political representation in three European territorial states: France, Castile, and Holland. It tackles the following question: If having a representative assembly with strong control over finance had major advantages, then why could territorial states not emulate the institutions present in their city-state neighbors? The chapter first considers the early history of the rentes sur l'Hôtel de Ville and how it set the stage for the French monarchy's frequent difficulty in later obtaining access to credit. It then discusses absolutism in Castile and Castilian public credit in the seventeenth century, along with representative assemblies in the Dutch Republic. The experience of France, Castile, and the Dutch Republic shows that most territorial states faced obstacles in establishing an intensive form of political representation, and thus in gaining access to credit.

This chapter examines the impact of Bellarmine’s theory in the debate over the Oath of Allegiance, promulgated by James Stuart in 1606. James’s attempt to shift the boundaries of the sovereign’s ...
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This chapter examines the impact of Bellarmine’s theory in the debate over the Oath of Allegiance, promulgated by James Stuart in 1606. James’s attempt to shift the boundaries of the sovereign’s authority beyond simple civil obedience hit the heart of Bellarmine’s doctrine of the indirecta potestas, which was introduced precisely to shift the boundaries of the Pope’s spiritual jurisdiction beyond simple spiritual authority, and indirectly into political matters. This chapter shows the theoretical and political impact of Bellarmine’s theory in early Stuart England by following closely the debate between Bellarmine, James and William Barclay. This chapter, thus, offers important elements not only to understand the significance of the Jesuit’s theories but also to gain a more accurate and historically nuanced explanation of James’s absolutism and its theoretical roots.Less

Bellarmine and the Oath of Allegiance

Stefania Tutino

Published in print: 2010-10-21

This chapter examines the impact of Bellarmine’s theory in the debate over the Oath of Allegiance, promulgated by James Stuart in 1606. James’s attempt to shift the boundaries of the sovereign’s authority beyond simple civil obedience hit the heart of Bellarmine’s doctrine of the indirecta potestas, which was introduced precisely to shift the boundaries of the Pope’s spiritual jurisdiction beyond simple spiritual authority, and indirectly into political matters. This chapter shows the theoretical and political impact of Bellarmine’s theory in early Stuart England by following closely the debate between Bellarmine, James and William Barclay. This chapter, thus, offers important elements not only to understand the significance of the Jesuit’s theories but also to gain a more accurate and historically nuanced explanation of James’s absolutism and its theoretical roots.

The most popular concepts of happiness among psychologists are ones according to which happiness is “satisfaction with life as a whole”. There are hundreds of non‐equivalent forms of Whole Life ...
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The most popular concepts of happiness among psychologists are ones according to which happiness is “satisfaction with life as a whole”. There are hundreds of non‐equivalent forms of Whole Life Satisfactionism. However, every precise conception either requires actual satisfaction with life or requires hypothetical satisfaction with life. Arguments are presented to demonstrate that a person can be “happy” even though he is not actually making any judgment about the extent to which he is satisfied with his life. Other arguments show that a person can be “unhappy” even though it is not correct to say that if he were to think about his life, he would be dissatisfied with it. This shows that happiness cannot be identified with whole life satisfaction. Appendix A contains discussion of problems concerning interactions between temporal considerations and WLS theories of happiness. Appendix B discusses the idea that happiness can be defined as the score that a person achieves on a suitable happiness test.Less

Whole Life Satisfaction Concepts of Happiness

Fred Feldman

Published in print: 2010-03-18

The most popular concepts of happiness among psychologists are ones according to which happiness is “satisfaction with life as a whole”. There are hundreds of non‐equivalent forms of Whole Life Satisfactionism. However, every precise conception either requires actual satisfaction with life or requires hypothetical satisfaction with life. Arguments are presented to demonstrate that a person can be “happy” even though he is not actually making any judgment about the extent to which he is satisfied with his life. Other arguments show that a person can be “unhappy” even though it is not correct to say that if he were to think about his life, he would be dissatisfied with it. This shows that happiness cannot be identified with whole life satisfaction. Appendix A contains discussion of problems concerning interactions between temporal considerations and WLS theories of happiness. Appendix B discusses the idea that happiness can be defined as the score that a person achieves on a suitable happiness test.

This chapter considers how Locke's extensive attack on Robert Filmer in the First Treatise is just one part of his larger political project of recoining a language of probable judgment. The specific ...
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This chapter considers how Locke's extensive attack on Robert Filmer in the First Treatise is just one part of his larger political project of recoining a language of probable judgment. The specific arguments that Filmer advances are not as threatening to Locke as Filmer's general appeal to a type of divine certainty based on Scripture. Locke is eager to show that Filmerian certainty is both rationally groundless and politically disastrous. His sustained effort to discredit the patriarchal defense of absolutism is part of an attempt to supplant Filmer's method of justification with a new vocabulary of judgment. By insisting on the distance between the mind of God and the minds of men, Locke can transform Filmer's appeal to divine providence into a call for active and industrious application of limited human faculties.Less

Douglas John Casson

Published in print: 2011-01-23

This chapter considers how Locke's extensive attack on Robert Filmer in the First Treatise is just one part of his larger political project of recoining a language of probable judgment. The specific arguments that Filmer advances are not as threatening to Locke as Filmer's general appeal to a type of divine certainty based on Scripture. Locke is eager to show that Filmerian certainty is both rationally groundless and politically disastrous. His sustained effort to discredit the patriarchal defense of absolutism is part of an attempt to supplant Filmer's method of justification with a new vocabulary of judgment. By insisting on the distance between the mind of God and the minds of men, Locke can transform Filmer's appeal to divine providence into a call for active and industrious application of limited human faculties.